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Academic Communication for Advanced Secondary Schools Utilising ICT in academic communication

(a) Publication dates and currency of information
The specific time that an academic work was produced is essential when using
it as evidence. Publication dates indicate how current or relevant information in
the source is in the field. The currency of a source can be just as important as the
source’s date of publication, depending on the nature of the research. For example,
areas such as technology and the sciences are fast-moving, and what was accurate
FOR ONLINE READING ONLY
and cutting-edge 50 years ago might now be common knowledge. However, in areas
such as English studies or the more historical fields, the historical context provided
by sources written in different eras will undoubtedly be important.
(b) Author credentials and affiliations
When you use academic materials for research, you must ensure that the authors of
such articles have the necessary credentials and affiliations. This information can
typically be found on an author’s faculty page, his/her social media platforms profile,
or sometimes in the introductory section of the material. By looking into an author’s
credentials and affiliations, you can better understand their expertise, the perspective
from which they are writing, and the level of trust you can place in their work.

(c) Peer-reviewed publications
Try as much as possible to use articles from peer-reviewed journals to get academic
information. These are written by experts in the field who have been through a
rigorous peer review process. Their works are examined by professionals in the
field to ensure that they are of high quality and that the information is accurate and
reliable. The information in a peer-reviewed article is more likely to be reliable and
relevant than that found in non-peer-reviewed publications. Readers should always
critically evaluate the credibility and provenance of information found in these
sources before using it in their work. Not all online content is appropriate for use in
academic research. For example, open-access sources may include both high-quality
and low-quality materials. Check if it has the information that needs citing. This is
important for creating citations and bibliographies.
Organising and citing academic sources
Different referencing styles are required for various types of documents. For example,
the American Psychological Association (APA) is usually used for social science subjects
and Modern Language Association (MLA) is usually used for humanities subjects.
Today, ICT has addressed all difficulties in remembering different formats, author’s
names and information orders through reference management software. Most citation
software will work as an add-on to your Word document, such as Microsoft Word or
Google Docs. From the toolbar, you can do a lot of work like adding references, changing
your referencing style and even choosing which part of the document you do not want
the software to touch once the write-up and references have been finalised. It is also
easy to track your in-text citations and references. For example, suppose you want to
insert a new reference in the second paragraph of your work. In this case, you may find
it time-consuming to look through all the references and return to the correct position
where the cursor was. But now, by using software, you can use the search function to

44 Student’s Book Form Five

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Academic Communication.indd 44 30-Jun-24 11:02:05 AM